Communications quickly spread that the fourth base appeared to still be safe, and the fleet began gathering there for resupply. Then came rifts, and a volley of powerful energy beams, the main forward guns of the Enlightener ships, more deadly even than those of Starbases. With each shot, a ship disappeared. Varen’s voice opened on every communication speaker.
“All units, prepare to rift to SEPARATE points! No ship is to be within one million kilometers of another. If you are not fired at in your new location, stay put! Open rifts! Go!”
Once again, the League fleet rifted. This time to random points, as Varen had ordered, and resumed fire. That fire was taking its toll. The deadly heavy lasers and energy cannons of the Gunships, each operated by a lone exceptionally skilled volunteer, were slowly carving starbases apart. The massed fire of the Liberty and Independence starships was destroying everything else in space.
Then came more attacks. Elder railguns, lasers, and energy beams took their toll. League ships moved again. It became a very strange kind of hunt, where the hunted were gradually destroying the enemy they could see, while being picked off by those they couldn’t.
However, over time, the odds began to change. Some League ships found safe points in space where they must have been unseen, and methodically continued their work. It was like some hideous process of evolution, with those who had chosen wisely or luckily surviving, and those who did not, being destroyed. For the volunteers back home, controlling the Gunships, it was disappointing, for the crews on their ships, it was life or death.
Eventually, after the loss of two thousand Liberty Ships, thirty of the more powerful Independence star cruisers, and nearly five thousand Gunships, the situation began to stabilize. Safe, for whatever reason, in their new locations, they ground the mighty starbases to so much scrap in space, eliminated the new Rift Gun platforms in orbit, and then went to work hunting down Caltrop Missiles.
Then began a kind of standoff. The Protectorate hadn’t found their remaining forces, perhaps couldn’t, but on the other hand, could strike as soon as any League forces arrived on Earth.
///
Back at what was now being called League Command headquarters, Karden considered what had happened. It was clear the Protectorate forces hadn’t been putting out that withering fire from the few rift gun platforms around Earth. It was clear as well the enemy had a base of their own, somewhere out in interstellar space or at one of the systems where the League hadn’t yet put spy satellites. And there were three hundred Warden Ships out there. He was sure they hadn’t jumped far.
What was far worse though was the mysterious ability the Protectorate had acquired of discovering their locations. Somehow or other, they were being watched. But it wasn’t perfect. Through trial and fatal error, his forces had found places, seemingly random, where they couldn’t be seen, but how so?
He put sent orders to the crews currently slowly hauling hundreds of thousands of regular rift gun platforms to the front to get as many as could be found within range, not of Earth, but of his own forces. He had Abida put out the word to hundreds of thousands of volunteers to scan space. On an instinct, he told them to concentrate on areas where League ships had been successfully shot.
Once again the result came back surprisingly swiftly. In the vicinity of one of the destroyed operating bases, not far, less than a thousand kilometers in fact, a volunteer spotted something. A modified stealth shuttle, like the one used to ferry Skrai’kiik, rifted in, retrieved whatever it was, and hurriedly rifted back.
On analysis, it proved to be a tiny satellite, designed to do a very simple task, detect the flashes of energy associated with an opening rift, and relay the coordinates to someone. There must have been hundreds of millions of them scattered in space to achieve any kind of coverage even in the near vicinity of Sol, but then at one time the Protectorate had had the resources of a galaxy to throw at such things.
Karden toyed with the idea of trying to conduct a further search to find the Protectorate base, and then abandoned it. They were going to have to do this the hard way. The regular Rift Gun batteries, hundreds of thousands of them, were close enough to fire a few shots before they ran out of power. It would have to do.
He gave the order.
///
Nuclear missiles rifted into space near Luna. They annihilated the ground batteries, and with them, millions of lives. In the wake of that strike followed the League fleet; five thousand Liberty warships, one hundred seventy Independence star cruisers, and the Vigilant.
The expected hail of enemy fire came through rifts. As Karden had hoped, the Warden Ships sprang their trap. They opened wormholes close in, near the League fleet between Earth and its moon. Many wormholes must have become unstable and failed, because only two hundred sixty Warden Ships came through. They opened devastating fire on the League fleet. Hundreds of Liberty ships disappeared. They had sprung their trap well.
Now Star Marshal Varen sprang his.
The League fleet rifted away, leaving nuclear missiles behind them. These exploded directly in the path of the Warden Ships. A wave of death swept across the Protectorate fleet. Then, new rifts opened amidst it, and a hundred thousand Rift Guns opened fire. They had only a few shots each, but they did their job. Sustained fire from the energy cannons of the Gunships finished it.
Now Varen and his fleet returned. With them came something new. Large portal rings in space, rifted at frightening cost in antimatter from distant bases. Through these new rings came dozens, then hundreds, then thousands of Starfighters. Behind this, yet another group rifted in, the thousand Beachhead class dropships. They were little more than heavily armored bricks in space, their potent shields glowing deep blue like those of starbases.
White energy beams from the Enlightener ships came by rift, struck home. Ships disappeared, but there were far too many to stop. They went on to Earth. And with them came war, to a planet that had not known it in nearly ten thousand years.
58
On the surface of Earth, near the vast city known for three thousand years simply as Presidium, Supreme Army General Werner waited with his forces. He had six million troops and ten million militia ready at this city, millions more elsewhere. Above him, the vastly outnumbered air forces of Earth were quickly crumbling. He knew the enemy would enjoy complete air supremacy, and he knew equally, he would eventually lose.
But he was going to make them pay dearly for their victory.
As his forces, fast hovertanks, mobile artillery, antiaircraft batteries, heavy infantry in power armor, and lightly armed but brave Elder militia, strained under the ever-growing strafes and airstrikes of the enemy, he watched the dropships descend. Looking more like colossal bombs than spacecraft, he wondered what they portended. They were small, far too small to carry many troops, and there were less than a thousand of them.
They crashed to the ground, powerful shields protecting them from the impact. Shockwaves knocked down whatever and whomever was nearby. League Starfighters and the larger ships overhead rained death down in the landing area. But Werner still had forces there, ready.
The ships opened, and what came out were not men, but large rings, with nothing inside them.
They planted on the ground in an instant, and suddenly through them came hundreds of missiles, powerful ones. Werner watched in dismay as his front lines shattered under massive conventional explosions.
Behind the missiles came hovertanks, and huge Rhurrg and Shulgar infantry in power armor scaled to their size, after them came infantry of many races, then more, and then more, an impossible number more. Werner guessed the rings must be sending full armies of ground troops straight from their planets. There would be no end of them, hundreds of millions if the enemy needed them.
But he was an Elder, and an officer of the Galactic Protectorate. He and his men fought on, to the very end.
///
Hraragurr had insisted on leading the ground attack. He wouldn’t have missed this fight for anything.
<
br /> “Onward! This is it, for liberty, to victory! GRRRRR!” he roared.
With overwhelming air superiority, and an equally overwhelming advantage in numbers, his army swept into the city of Presidium. The Elders were eerily calm and disciplined as they fell back, lethally accurate in their fire. His Rhurrgs in full power armor were almost a match for them. Among the rest of his troops he was losing three or four for every Elder that fell.
But they were winning.
There was hard fighting in the streets. His losses mounted to six or seven for every regular Elder soldier, and two or three even against militia. His troops were getting angry. Unarmed Elder civilians were simply folding their hands when caught by the invading army. Some soldiers were shooting them as they stood there. He barked orders to his commanders and managed to keep things from turning into a slaughter.
Finally they reached it. The Galactic Central Presidium itself, towering, vast, bright and golden-domed. Hraragurr led the advance personally.
The Ara’kaa shrieked and called in fury, the Rhurrg bellowed joyfully in their deep voices, others made stranger and less comprehensible noises, still others moved forward in silence. The building ahead was already damaged by the bombardment. Burning vehicles and fallen Elder soldiers in smashed power armor were strewn along the street.
A squad of Elder guards in elaborate golden power armor were stationed at the shattered doors. They calmly took cover and fired with almost unbelievable accuracy, nearly every shot counting. But they were outnumbered thousands to one. Hraragurr’s troops gunned them down and swept through the foyer into the great chamber.
The vast gilded dome rose above them. Row upon row of seats lined the circular walls. On those seats were communications equipment, supplies, and here and there, weapons. In front of the seats stood the members of the Presidium, in robes of blue and gold. There were nearly a thousand Elders, and no more than forty of other species. In the open spaces at the base of the circle of seats were staffers in pure blue. All calmly faced the invaders, hands behind their backs.
Hraragurr’s troops were tense; lifetimes, generations of pent-up resentment and hatred rising.
“Kill them all!” cried an Ara’kaa, “Finish them forever!”
“WAIT!” bellowed Hraragurr.
He knew things could spin out of control at any moment. He also knew this moment was of immense significance. He had no desire to slaughter the Presidium Members standing there unarmed at their benches. And, he thought, doing so might well convince Elders across the galaxy, on thousands of worlds, to fight it out to the bitter end.
On the other hand, for the same reason, the Presidium could convince, at a word, the Elders to stop fighting, everywhere.
Time was short. He made a call.
///
The majority of the way across the galaxy, Haral Karden was watching images of the battles and sending instructions. He was simultaneously in conversation with Neem on a line. He received a call under a code only a few key commanders had. It was Hraragurr.
“Karden! We’ve done it! My troops are at the Galactic Central Presidium, and they are restless. I’m barely holding them back from a slaughter! Karden, the Presidium Members can still sway the remaining Protectorate worlds, the thousands we’ve planned to invade when this was done! They can give the word, and make them all stop fighting…!”
“If they are willing to, and they’re not already dead” added Karden.
“Exactly!”
“Patch me in, I’ll talk to them.”
“No, I really think you should come here in person.”
“Across the galaxy?” Karden was incredulous.
Then he thought about it. No, no further away than the next rift portal. With portals directly on the ground at the city, and others on various worlds or aboard the fleet, they had a clear chain of portals from Ground to Earth. He could go on foot, and be there in minutes.
“Neem, did you hear all that?”
“Yep.”
“Sorry, I’ve got to go.”
“Wait! Before you do, come up to the lab, I’ve got something for you.”
The lab meant Tadine, but it was just a rift portal away. He went there almost weekly, a short walk through the rift portal on the GDC, no, now League Command grounds. He shrugged. Under the circumstances, even Neem wouldn’t have asked if he didn’t think it important.
A few moments later, a squad of guards in tow, he was there. He met Neem at the portal and followed him to the lab at a trot. His legs ached and he felt out of breath. His young guards weren’t even winded. He was getting too old for this. He went in.
Before him was a suit of power armor. It looked smaller than the massive battle suits of the Elders, and more agile. It was beautiful, a rich blue color, with gold Elder-style scrollwork and trim. On the chest was blazoned a golden sunburst – a symbol some people had unofficially started using as a symbol of the League.
“It’s for you to wear!” said Neem.
“Neem! Now?”
“Karden, you are about to step into a war zone. Whether or not they are shooting at this instant, they could. The least I can do is help keep you alive.”
“Well all right, yes, but… this must have taken a while… and why is it so elaborate?”
“It was originally just going to be a present, and I wanted it to look cool. I know you like Elder work, so I got some Elder artists and craftsmen, ones who joined our side, to do their thing with it. They said the blue and gold color scheme made sense given your position, whatever that meant.”
“Thanks! Now, let’s hurry.”
The armor was perfectly fitted to him, and surprisingly fast to don. However, he felt completely ridiculous in it. He, an old man, a history professor, wearing power armor! He felt foolish, he felt comical, he felt… strong.
Neem beamed, “Not only do you have several times your usual strength, but that armor is a step or two above Elder designs. It even has a little shielding and can stand up to a few direct rounds from railguns!”
“Thank you, I do mean it, now I’m off.”
And he and his little squad of guards went through the rift portal.
///
Not long ago, the last thing Karden would have imagined himself doing was donning power armor and taking command of a motley army of aliens, on a planet on the far side of the galaxy, but here he was. Danger or not, he raised the visor on his helmet, so they could see it was him.
Karden was again surprised at the incomprehensible, inhuman calm self-control of the Elders. Here they were, a group of politicians, in the midst of disaster, with an invading army aiming guns in their chamber, and they looked as if they were merely waiting for the next debate to begin. Then his musings were interrupted. Encouraged by his presence, some of the soldiers were raising guns at the Elders, ready to fire.
“NO!” roared Karden, as he raced to the front, spun, and faced his troops.
There was confusion, hesitation.
“THE LIBERATOR COMMANDS!” bellowed Hraragurr.
There was that title again. No time for distraction now. The war was over, or could be, if he made the right choices. Tension crackled in the air
“The liberator!” cried hundreds of soldiers “Hail the liberator!”
“We have won!” shouted Karden in his clearest, loudest voice.
Cheers erupted from the troops, shouts of joy rather than rage. Karden had to act now before the mood turned again.
“Soldiers, await my command, I will accept the surrender of the Presidium.”
He advanced to what appeared to be their leader, an Elder with snowy white hair and robes so richly decorated they were mostly gold, standing on a podium at the end of the room. Karden prepared to speak, but the Elder was faster.
“Surrender? We will not tamely accept defeat. Threats will not avail you. Every one of us here is prepared to die in the cause of enlightenment.”
Karden frowned. “I believe you. However, you have already been defeated. Now yo
u must merely decide what to do with the situation. You can die uselessly, or you can live, and still do some good for the galaxy.”
“What do you mean?”
“The Galactic Protectorate is no more. Its forces are destroyed, surrendered or in disarray, and this world is now occupied by soldiers from a thousand others. Even the squadron of Enlighteners can do nothing but hide or act like pirates, until they are found or run out of supplies. But this isn’t the end. Not of you, and not of galactic civilization. It will go on. It can go on with some new order that provides peace, but peace on the terms of all those who inhabit it, or it can collapse into chaos.”
The Elder leader looked at him, his expression unreadable. Karden could feel the eyes of everyone in the room upon him. He went on.
“You, the members of this council, the Galactic Presidium, and in fact all the Elders, have experience in leadership, in administration on an interstellar scale as none of the rest of us do, and you have knowledge of science that can now, at last, be imparted to others, for the benefit of all. There is much you can do.”
“I recognize you from report images. You are the one called Professor Haral Karden, the organizer of the rebellion?” said the Elder, eyes taking in his blue and gold power armor.
“Yes.”
“I am Presidium Speaker Ozerov. What do you propose?”
“You have long governed this galaxy without admitting that you were doing so. I propose the first formation of an official government, one in both fact and name. I propose a government that is inclusive of all the inhabitants of the galaxy who wish to join it, but forces no one to do so.”
Karden’s voice rose. He could feel the energy rising in the room. He fed it.
“All of us, Elders, Ara’kaa, Rhurrg, Imri, Tsamier, Vt’k’k, Shulgar, my people the Grounders, and all others, everyone equal in rights, able to serve in government, the military, the sciences, business, as we choose! I propose that the leadership of this government be selected by those they lead.”
Alien Empire Page 40
